December 11th attacks: Official death toll rises to 37

14/12/2007

[Getty Images] Ban Ki-moon

Official data released Thursday (December 13th) by Algeria's interior ministry said at least 37 people were killed in Tuesday's twin car bomb attacks in Algiers. The new toll followed the discovery Wednesday of three bodies in the ruins of UN offices in Hydra. UN spokesperson Marie Heuze said the latest casualty list showed that 11 UN employees died in the attack and five are still missing, AP reported. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon sent the head of the UN Development Programme (UNDP) Kemal Dervis to Algiers to meet the families of the victims and to visit the injured.

Also Thursday, security services said they identified the two terrorists that perpetrated the attacks. The suicide bomber who attacked the UN refugee agency is 64-year old Ibrahim Abu Otmane, a former member of the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS). Otmane was in an advanced stage of cancer and his two sons, members of the Armed Islamic Group (GIA), were killed by Algerian army forces. The other bomber is 32-year old Larbi Charef, a.k.a. Abderrahmane Abu Abdenacer al-Assimi, from the impoverished Algiers suburb of Oued Ouchayeh. He was imprisoned in 2005 for supporting terrorist groups, but was released in 2006. Both men benefited earlier from the Charter for Peace and National Reconciliation.